Photonic materials are a forefront technology in many areas including high speed telecommunications, photometrics, and sensor devices. For example, wavelength division multiplexing techniques are commonly used to independently transmit a plurality of signals over an optical fiber, and independent data streams are carried by optical fields propagating through an optical fiber at different optical carrier wavelengths corresponding to various signal channels. Photonic materials provide high bandwidth and conserved transmission of information while serving, in some instances, as selective optical filters unaided by traditional chromatic filters. However, engineering of optical systems that include certain photonic materials requires complex and difficult to manufacture components such as modulating and switching devices that need extensive active alignment procedures during fabrication or assembly, resulting in expensive systems that are time-consuming to produce and operate. Such systems often require conversion between optical signals and electronic signals, which can inefficiently consume power. Although headway has been made in using resonant circumferential mode optical resonators for direct optical coupling of a propagating mode of an optical fiber resonant with the optical resonator, application of such photonic materials is still being developed.
Accordingly, methods and equipment for using photonic materials involving optical resonator technology would be advantageous and would be favorably received in the art.